1HKOs

[Plague Bringer]

"BLAH TREM AND Q3 ARE THE SAME GAME BECAUSE THE SAME ENGINE LOL"]fist statement is laughable.  you DO realise that the humans are basically just reskinned q3 weapons for the most part..... right?  you do see that little console message now in again telling you you might have "built ioquake3 with a buggy compiler"... right?  how is trem different than vanilla q3? ¹ you have to charge the rocket launcher. ² the plasma rifle does not have splash. ³ you can only zoom with the railgun. ⁴ you have to reload most things. ⁵ you get a flamethrower instead of a grenade launcher. ⁶ buildables. ⁷ armor does not decrease. ⁸ aliens have a wide range of HP.... but no armor. ⁹ wallwalk. ¹⁰ location based damage. ¹¹ oh, a dodge button. ^{(AND PLENTY FUCKING MORE.} i think that's about it.  the weapons are for the most part the same.

I suppose Mass Effect, Gears of War and Mortal Kombat vs. DC are all roughly the same, too, right? After all, they're all on the Unreal 3 engine.

We have a rifle, yes. We have a sniper rifle, yes. We have a "rocket launcher" and a plasma rifle, yes. We have a melee weapon, yes. Are you saying that these things are 100% perfectly equivalent to their vanilla Q3 "counterparts"? That they have retained their damage values, fire rates, ranges, accuracies, and balances and imbalances from the original game? I missed the memo that any game with these weapons is similar to Q3. Is there an email going around? Should I check my community flier? Notice board? Call up the town Crier? Call the Prime Minister? The President? The Queen? Wait... Half Life has these weapons (even the grenade laucher!). And bi-pedal aliens just like Q3, too! Oh my God, it makes so much fucking sense now. Half Life is Q3.

I'm done here. I can't listen to your ridiculous preaching about Tremulous and Quake 3 being "roughly the same game". The weapon choice is slightly comparable. The weapons are not.

[Anonymoose]

If you really think aliens can't "gang up", watch any scrim and you'll see that it is very much possible with every class available. It tends to happen quite often in public games as well. I at least constantly get dretch-stormed on the official servers, or have to try to survive 2-3 goons/marauders/basilisks at once. (You can skip 17 minutes of basically nothing in the demo with a demo.cfg.)

A dretch storm is the only real way aliens can gang up, in all other alien classes having teammates around you while fighting is a hindrance. Dretches are fast and don't accidentally hit teammates but try and fight alongside a teammate with any other class and you will generally do better without your teammate getting in the way, bleeding you, blocking your pounces, stuffing up your maneuvers etc...

[Nux]

Yes, bad teammates are a hindrance. Sadly this is a team game and what teammates you have matters. Still, there are things you can do to work well with your team no matter how bad they are. For example, you can still 'gang up' when going down risky hallways to minimise the chance you're hit even if you don't actually attack the enemy while your stupid team is busy being stupid. When attacking it's actually advisable you don't all go for the same target at the same time, but instead wait for a fleeing teammate to be chased and strike in that gap then retreat to your friends just as the previous guy did. Aliens work very well with this hit and run tactic and you'll see it used by any clan worth thier salt.

[Dracone]

Just because hitting your teammates becomes a possibility in gang attacks with larger classes doesn't mean you shouldn't gang up anyways. The way that's being brought up here, it's just an excuse for not knowing how to properly maneuver yourself around the location and the players in the combat situation, as well as having no confidence in accuracy. And anyone who's played Trem for a decent amount of time with their eyes open SHOULD know this. Watch a scrim with clans that are good sometime, and you'll see that people can easily throw 4 goons at a human group and none of the goons end up hitting anyone else. Granted, it is sometimes a better strategy to hang back and NOT attack, even while between enemies and in range, if only to allow the scenario to settle down so you have better chances of cleaning up. But I've found this to be extremely rare.

I will say this, however: Based on location, there's a breaking point (in PUBLIC games) at which the potential for the aliens to win combat situations goes down with every additional alien that joins the team and goes out of his base. The aliens DO require space, while the humans do not. More humans means more potential to kill and win. This applies only to public games only though in which it's a hopeless endeavor to control the movements of the entire large team. In a scrimmage or match, you have no excuse for not organizing your team in such a way that you can still kill a group of 8-10 humans, or more.

[RAKninja-Decepticon]

i'll do away with quotes as they are taking up too much space, just scan for your name.

nux:

 twas a day or so before creating the topic i think, early morning CST like 4-5 AM.  was no more than 8 players in the game  i think i might have been bubble crab at the time, i change names so much it's hard to keep track.  you and coco, i think it was, camped our eggs out from start to finish against me and one or two other random whitenames.  as for movement, in big maps, i agree.  in smallish maps, it is a non-issue.  i also hold move value in combat performance over crossing the map quickly.

meisseli:

 there is also the shotgun, massdriver, and not instant but still close: the flamer and painsaw.  also, a clan scrim might as well be considered a seperate gametype for all the relation it has to a public game.  in a clan game you have a level of teamwork and cohesion that is flatly not possible in the vast, vast majority of public games you will play.

plague bringer:

 no, yes, and no, respectively.  mass effect and mk vs dc are both total conversions of the engine, not "just a mod".  oh yes, transformers: war for cybertron is also thinly disguised UT.  trem weapons are not 100% reskinned copies of vanilla q3 weapons.  you might have missed the qualifier "slightly modified" that i used when referring to trem weapons as default q3 weapons.  aside from slight tweaks, yes our weapons are nearly identical to q3 weaponry.  any other perceived differences are not in the weapons themselves, but in the targets.  in vanilla q3 you are targeting other players with 200 max hp, and armor that protects more as you have more, up to a max of 200.  in trem you are fighting against aliens with scaling HP from 25 to 350 with no armor.  thus, a rocket launcher that kills a default q3 fresh spawn in two shots will oneshot anything less than a mara. 

as to half-life being q3, you should learn the development history of the source engine.  source is really nothing more than reverse engineered q3 with a few extras added in.  that aside, wanna stick to the subject?  i understand you feel attached to trem, but there really is no reason to get insulting and juvenile because i voiced my opinion and made a suggestion.  if you are truly so offended that you feel you must make personal attacks, perhaps you need to take a break from the internet for a little while.

anonymoose:

 exactly.  it's not so much i am worried about killing my teammates, it is that i am worried about them killing/bleeding me.  i've been killed a few seconds after all combat has ended by overenthusiastic teammates on more than one occasion.  i just roll with it as basi, part of the class, but as a rant it is quite.... irritating.

dracone:

 aside from what i said to moose, i am not a member of, nor do i plan to ever be a member of, a clan.  i have no interest in dealing with clan servers or watching clan games. i am more than willing to work with my team on US1.  all this "ganging up talk" is besides the real point of "RAK does not like 1HKOs"

[Nux]

This seems to match your description. If this is the game you mean then you must be talking about the part at 3:00. If you look at this, I hope you'll appreciate that I am indeed trying to kill the egg when I'm able to.

You seem to be under my crosshair a lot there. >.>

[F50]

I understand you feel attached to trem, but there really is no reason to get insulting and juvenile because i voiced my opinion and made a suggestion.  if you are truly so offended that you feel you must make personal attacks, perhaps you need to take a break from the internet for a little while.

I'm done here. I can't listen to your ridiculous preaching about Tremulous and Quake 3 being "roughly the same game". The weapon choice is slightly comparable. The weapons are not.

Heh. Dude, that isn't a personal attack, that is him saying that your argument is idotic. He is right. And yes, duty calls.

[Plague Bringer]

And yes, duty calls.

That it does.

[Anonymoose]

Just because hitting your teammates becomes a possibility in gang attacks with larger classes doesn't mean you shouldn't gang up anyways. The way that's being brought up here, it's just an excuse for not knowing how to properly maneuver yourself around the location and the players in the combat situation, as well as having no confidence in accuracy. And anyone who's played Trem for a decent amount of time with their eyes open SHOULD know this. Watch a scrim with clans that are good sometime, and you'll see that people can easily throw 4 goons at a human group and none of the goons end up hitting anyone else. Granted, it is sometimes a better strategy to hang back and NOT attack, even while between enemies and in range, if only to allow the scenario to settle down so you have better chances of cleaning up. But I've found this to be extremely rare.

I will say this, however: Based on location, there's a breaking point (in PUBLIC games) at which the potential for the aliens to win combat situations goes down with every additional alien that joins the team and goes out of his base. The aliens DO require space, while the humans do not. More humans means more potential to kill and win. This applies only to public games only though in which it's a hopeless endeavor to control the movements of the entire large team. In a scrimmage or match, you have no excuse for not organizing your team in such a way that you can still kill a group of 8-10 humans, or more.

Yeah man i dont wanna rule out a bit of alien group action, of course it can be managed in organized teams but i deliberately left that out and used the word 'generally' so that you could waste your time pointing out the obvious.

[Menace13]

[Nux]

I can give a much better example of spawncamp from earlier today which blurs the lines between strategy and nuisance. In this case it just so happens that the best thing for me to do is avoid killing eggs until backup arrives.

[RAKninja-Decepticon]

I understand you feel attached to trem, but there really is no reason to get insulting and juvenile because i voiced my opinion and made a suggestion.  if you are truly so offended that you feel you must make personal attacks, perhaps you need to take a break from the internet for a little while.

I'm done here. I can't listen to your ridiculous preaching about Tremulous and Quake 3 being "roughly the same game". The weapon choice is slightly comparable. The weapons are not.

Heh. Dude, that isn't a personal attack, that is him saying that your argument is idotic. He is right. And yes, duty calls.

it's a mod.  no shame in it, and that does not make it any less great or fun.  but it is just a mod.  the engine and interface remain fairly intact.  there has been a cosmetic overhaul, and some elements were added or changed.  but at the very core of it, trem is a mod of quake3.

yes, i also describe a fair amount of commercial "games" as mods, as that is what they are.

your selective quote is not what what i was calling a personal attack.  i was talking about plague bringer's apparent inability to express his displeasure  in a "civil tone".  he kept arguing further and further afield of the issue that i restate in a single sentence each post "RAK does not like any 1HKO", in an effort to prove that "i'm just whining because i suck and dont know how to play".  culminating in the posting of amiwittyyet.jpg. 

and again, explicitly - "RAK does not like any 1HKO.  not taking them, not giving them"

[Dracone]

Yeah, but you're terrible at the game, as well as highly inexperienced, making your opinion on this matter worthless to the game's development.

Move to Off Topic.

[F50]

and again, explicitly - "RAK does not like any 1HKO.  not taking them, not giving them"

Then you're opinion sucks and you don't know how to play tremulous .

[Plague Bringer]

RAK, you're trying to convince me and everyone else here that all ioQ3 based games are essentially Q3, just because their engine is the same. Do you know what a game engine is? American McGee's Alice is Q3. It's nothing like Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Or Heavy Metal FAKK. Or Iron Grip: Warlord. Damage values, bullet speeds, armor, health, spread, movement speed, weapon type, splash damage. All these things are what differentiate games. To say that Tremulous and Q3 are basically the same is akin to saying CoD and Q3 are roughly the same game. Or, fuck, Deus Ex and Adventure Pinball: Forgotten Island.

Also, stop being so fucking anal about everything I say. I'm not hiding insults. If I tell you that "you fucked up and the enemy now has better equipment than you", I don't mean "you're whining because you suck". I mean "you fucked up and the enemy now has better equipment than you". If I want to insult you I'll insult you directly, dillweed.

[ULTRA Random ViruS]

this is something that has been greatly irritating me recently.  most games (including default Q3) have 0 one kit ko weapons.  please correct me if i am wrong about any of this next part -

goon - first alien available that can oneshot a helmetless human, with a chomp, or armorless human, with a full pounce.
rant - can oneshot helmetless humans with maul, and "near instantly" kill armorless humans with trample

shotgun - can oneshot dretches from down a hall or across the room, 2-shot basi's
MD - oneshots dretches, two for basi
nade - it oneshots dretches, basi's, perhaps even maras, but is more understandable, as a single use weapon.
luci - oneshots up to maras with a charged shot, easily oneshots below maras with splash that deceptively extends far past the particle effect.

You got some of them wrong as well, im gonna shove them all at you at the same time without reading other replies... grenade does 310 damage, thats all aliens except tyrant. But somehow i managed to instant kill a rant with a nade by putting one on its head, it having full hp. Luci max does somewhere around 300 in gpp and 256 in 1.1. MD is meant to be a sniper. Shotgun, the spread, somewhat i think got wider, and i find it harder to hit than 1.1. All pellets does 56/55 in gpp. Oh well. Soo much for balance...
Also, i think the easy-headshot was probably because of the new physics in gpp, i find it easier to headbite when i aim lower, also probably because of the head-armour area update thingy.

[RAKninja-Decepticon]

Yeah, but you're terrible at the game, as well as highly inexperienced, making your opinion on this matter worthless to the game's development.

Move to Off Topic.

then tell me why 1HKOs are an integral game element that must be preserved. 

RAK, you're trying to convince me and everyone else here that all ioQ3 based games are essentially Q3, just because their engine is the same. Do you know what a game engine is? American McGee's Alice is Q3. It's nothing like Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Or Heavy Metal FAKK. Or Iron Grip: Warlord. Damage values, bullet speeds, armor, health, spread, movement speed, weapon type, splash damage. All these things are what differentiate games. To say that Tremulous and Q3 are basically the same is akin to saying CoD and Q3 are roughly the same game. Or, fuck, Deus Ex and Adventure Pinball: Forgotten Island.

Also, stop being so fucking anal about everything I say. I'm not hiding insults. If I tell you that "you fucked up and the enemy now has better equipment than you", I don't mean "you're whining because you suck". I mean "you fucked up and the enemy now has better equipment than you". If I want to insult you I'll insult you directly, dillweed.

i see now i have no one to blame but myself, for indulging you with all of this off topic discussion.  no, not all ioQ3 games are Q3.... you are discounting the other ports of Q3.  they are MOSTLY thinly modded Q3.  alice, for example, changes the interface and elements enough for me to consider it a total conversion.  plugging numbers different from the default into variables in the game engine does not magically make it not a mod and into a full game.  RtCW is a Q3 mod.  yes, CoD is modded (more than many, mind you) Q3.

if i were to make a total conversion for, say, morrowwind.... using none of the included art assets, none of the included scripts, and modifying every available setting in the engine itself that i could, would my total conversion mod count as a "full game"?  no, it is but a mod.

now if i took the netemmerse/gamebryo engine, did what i did with the mod, only this time changing the interface and such, perhaps then it could be considered a "full game"  this is why i see FO3 as an oblivion mod, but whatever tycoon game it was that used gamebryo is not.

incidentally, this is why i believe valve hasent made an actual game since HL1.  they've been moding their reverse engineered Q3 for almost a decade now.

i compare trem to q3 because that is what it is.  it would not make sense to compare it to another teamwork based FPS with buildables, such as tribes2 (or to a lesser extent planetside, but comparing trem to planetside.... that's a molehill to a mountain.)  such games are either their own games, or more different to trem than trem is to q3.

this is like the arguments i used to get into with folks about L4D or TF2 being source mods.  i mean shit, as if running the game from a program named "hl2.exe" or some such was not an indicator.

now, for the third or fourth time this thread, lets stop getting off the topic of 1HKOs and veering into "personal definitions of what differentiates a mod from a "full game".  not every time the enemy gets better equipment is there a fuck up involved.  a player can hide in his base till he has creds/evos.  for one.  there are more than a few ways to get creds or evos without directly scoring a kill.  so again, rather than trying to find fault in me or even my resoning, how about telling me why 1HKOs are so important for game balance that we can not eliminate them?

[Meisseli]

You yourself have been pretty much the only guy going offtopic here, rambling about spawnkilling, Quake 3, how to dretch, whatnot...

It was told to you many many posts ago, that after getting kills, you get better equipment via evolving/buying equipment/staging. It is a pretty important and fun part of this game and in almost all cases defines the outcome of a game.

Shall I repeat this information to you in the next thread page again?

[RAKninja-Decepticon]

You yourself have been pretty much the only guy going offtopic here, rambling about spawnkilling, Quake 3, how to dretch, whatnot...

It was told to you many many posts ago, that after getting kills, you get better equipment via evolving/buying equipment/staging. It is a pretty important and fun part of this game and in almost all cases defines the outcome of a game.

Shall I repeat this information to you in the next thread page again?

you stage and get equipment, the enemy does the same.  only the tyrant is 100% immune to 1HKO, while it only takes larmor and a helmet for the humans.  getting consistently oneshotted is not fun, and consistently making them, to me, is about as fun as playing a point and click flash game. 

i ask again, why can we not go the way of other squad-based-tactical-first-person-shooters, and the parent game of tremulous itself, and avoid 1HKO?

or am i going to have to ask you why 1HKO are such an important gameplay element that they should be preserved yet again?

[F50]

i ask again, why can we not go the way of other squad-based-tactical-first-person-shooters, and the parent game of tremulous itself, and avoid 1HKO?

or am i going to have to ask you why 1HKO are such an important gameplay element that they should be preserved yet again?

As far as I know, other squad-based tactical FPSes have in general not avoided 1HKO, as I have stated before. You can scroll up if you need to read it again.

Weapons capable of 1 hit kills are an important gameplay element of tremulous. First and foremost: the dretch dies very quickly to concentrated weapons fire. There is no way to get around this without drastically changing the game. Any weapon that does 25 hp damage in one shot can kill the dretch in 1 hit. That is not much. However, it is the very essence of the dretch that it is fast, small, and has to use its agility to survive, rather than its large health reserves. It is equally essential to the nature of tremulous that other aliens, the dragoons, and the tyrant, are able to take hits, due to their size and style of play. Note that this is a deliberate contrast with the dretch.

Furthermore, any weapons capable of taking on dragoons, must be capable of dealing sufficient damage to kill dretches very quickly. Decreasing the rate of fire of a weapon means it needs to have more damage, capable of killing larger aliens, such as basilisks, marauders, or even dragoons in 1 or a few hits. Increasing the rate of fire (lasgun and pulse rifle are this to a very moderate amount), however, can actually make it more effective against dretches, for those who aren't quite as practiced with clay dretches. The variety in weapons that follow both philosophies, and not merely the high rate of fire philosophy, helps gives the human weapons in tremulous identity and flavor, in addition to providing interesting tactical choices and game balance.

You might consider answering the question, which has been asked of you before, why are 1 hit kills unbalanced? Or do you believe this to be simply unfun, despite being balanced?

[Anonymoose]

As far as I know, other squad-based tactical FPSes have in general not avoided 1HKO, as I have stated before. You can scroll up if you need to read it again.

Weapons capable of 1 hit kills are an important gameplay element of tremulous. First and foremost: the dretch dies very quickly to concentrated weapons fire. There is no way to get around this without drastically changing the game. Any weapon that does 25 hp damage in one shot can kill the dretch in 1 hit. That is not much. However, it is the very essence of the dretch that it is fast, small, and has to use its agility to survive, rather than its large health reserves. It is equally essential to the nature of tremulous that other aliens, the dragoons, and the tyrant, are able to take hits, due to their size and style of play. Note that this is a deliberate contrast with the dretch.

Furthermore, any weapons capable of taking on dragoons, must be capable of dealing sufficient damage to kill dretches very quickly. Decreasing the rate of fire of a weapon means it needs to have more damage, capable of killing larger aliens, such as basilisks, marauders, or even dragoons in 1 or a few hits. Increasing the rate of fire (lasgun and pulse rifle are this to a very moderate amount), however, can actually make it more effective against dretches, for those who aren't quite as practiced with clay dretches. The variety in weapons that follow both philosophies, and not merely the high rate of fire philosophy, helps gives the human weapons in tremulous identity and flavor, in addition to providing interesting tactical choices and game balance.

You might consider answering the question, which has been asked of you before, why are 1 hit kills unbalanced? Or do you believe this to be simply unfun, despite being balanced?

One hit kills are fine in moderation, its supposed to be a special thing :3

RAK is right, humans can be immune to ANY one hit kill by spending a mere 160 credits; which is not even equivalent to 1 alien evo (with aliens having a max of 9 and humans a max of 2000, its safe to assume that one alien evo is equivalent to 222.22 human credits)
Aliens are potentially vulnerable to one hit kills as a granger/advgranger/dretch/basi/advbasi/mara/advmara/goon/advgoon. So in order to be safe from one hit kills as aliens you HAVE to spend 5 evos (equivalent to 1111 or so credits).
So...
Aliens have to spend 694.44% more credits than humans do in order to be safe from one hit kills.

As a rule of thumb, in a First Person Shooter, the quicker you kill your opponent, the better.
So one hit kills are the absolute fucking bees knees in FPS games, An area in which aliens are rather disadvantaged i must say.

And before you bigots jump in, im not complaining, I am saying it how it is. I like playing aliens, its more of a challenge, the kills are more satisfying and its simply more fun (im sure a number of other players feel the same way about playing aliens, but hey, with the millions of people who play tremulous, a small number like that wont skew the tremstats data at all aye ).

[Nux]

As a lot has already been said, I'll avoid repeating it.

Weakening all attacks could work out nicely. It could make teamwork more important and fighting more common because it's less risky. It could also make the game slower and more predictable.

[Qrntz]

millions of people who play tremulous

wait what

[Meisseli]

RAK is right, humans can be immune to ANY one hit kill by spending a mere 160 credits; which is not even equivalent to 1 alien evo (with aliens having a max of 9 and humans a max of 2000, its safe to assume that one alien evo is equivalent to 222.22 human credits)
Aliens are potentially vulnerable to one hit kills as a granger/advgranger/dretch/basi/advbasi/mara/advmara/goon/advgoon. So in order to be safe from one hit kills as aliens you HAVE to spend 5 evos (equivalent to 1111 or so credits).
So...
Aliens have to spend 694.44% more credits than humans do in order to be safe from one hit kills.

Lucifer equipment costs at least 760 credits (in a typical situation 800 or 860, + nade 200), is a projectile, needs to be charged up, is relatively easy to dodge. Sure you can make it sound dramatic with analysing these kind of "statistics" in a very grotesque way, but no, it's not that good of a weapon as implied.

1 evo is 175 credits.

[Asvarox]

Nope, one evo is 222 credits (devmap atcs, join aliens and spawn, /give funds 1, switch to humans). Other than that, yeah. The beauty about trem is that aliens =/= humans. Thus comparing one to the other is totally retarded.

[Meisseli]

Nope, one evo is 222 credits

Has it changed in GPP? I'm very confident it was 175 in 1.1.

[Asvarox]

IIRC in GPP you still get 175c/1evo from freefunds, but I'm certain when switching between teams 1 evo is equal to 222c (simply tested it ). I'm not sure how these things looked in 1.1 but i believe you're right there.

[Plague Bringer]

you stage and get equipment, the enemy does the same.  only the tyrant is 100% immune to 1HKO, while it only takes larmor and a helmet for the humans.  getting consistently oneshotted is not fun, and consistently making them, to me, is about as fun as playing a point and click flash game.  

i ask again, why can we not go the way of other squad-based-tactical-first-person-shooters, and the parent game of tremulous itself, and avoid 1HKO?

or am i going to have to ask you why 1HKO are such an important gameplay element that they should be preserved yet again?

Alright, RAK, yet again, if you are "consistently" getting one hit KOs, your enemy is doing something wrong, and if your enemy is "consistently" getting one hit KOs, YOU are doing something wrong. Stop trying to blame shitty playing/tactics on balanced game mechanics.

(Also, has anyone seen a thread about one hit KOs being unbalanced... EVER?)

EDIT: And my point about mods is that mods are not always comparable to their base games. What is balanced in HL2DM is not necessarily balanced in TF2, Vindictus, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, Perfect Dark: Source, or Mario Kart Source. Why? Because the fact that they share the same engine is irrelevant. I don't give a fuck what you see running in your Task Manager - all that tells you is that you're running games with the same engines. Weapons, weapon damage, health, armor, team differences, weapon ranges, gravity, player speed, player counts, maps, gametypes, weapon accessibility, powerups, etc. change the game completely. Red shells aren't imba in TF2 are they? What's that, they don't exist in TF2?

The engine is irrelevant. It's all about the game mechanics, and I think you can agree that Tremulous does not play like Quake3 in the least. To seriously compare a total conversion mod to its base is ridiculous.

[Qrntz]

IIRC in GPP you still get 175c/1evo from freefunds

It's 180 credits, equal to one shot down fresh dretch.

[F50]

As a rule of thumb, in a First Person Shooter, the quicker you kill your opponent, the better.
So one hit kills are the absolute fucking bees knees in FPS games, An area in which aliens are rather disadvantaged i must say.

Ok, so its about killing speed is it? Aside from the lucifer cannon, there is only a single alien which is killed in one hit consistently, the dretch. Depending on what the shotgun damage actually is (I think it is slightly below 60, actually), there is a minor possibillity that the basilisk could be one shotted as well. However, hitting such a target with every single shotgun pellet is not common. Now, Its possible, IMO, that one shot kills could favor the humans, and the game still be balanced, but let us, for one moment, pretend that the speed of instant kills needs to be roughly equal on both teams for balance to be achieved.

Now, dretches die in less than a second under normal conditions, so 1-shotting dretches is hardly a huge improvement. If you want to be completely technical, with unlagged, given 100 ping for both players (its not unusual for both players to have ~150 ping, but lets say its 100), that means that the dretch will have exactly 0.2 seconds to live after the human pulls the trigger, so we can quantify exactly how much faster 1 hit kills actually are than other kills (which will take the time the weapon would normally take to kill the alien, plus an additional 0.2 seconds). I have been in a few situations in which this mattered, and both the human and my dretch died simultaneously, with no one else around.

There are no other one shot kills besides the lucifer cannon. Now, 160cr is about equivalent to an evo, give or take a dozen credits depending on how you measure this (you can't, and it isn't reasonable to do so). As far as one hit kills are concerned, the humans and the aliens are roughly equal on this matter, except for the lucifer canno.

However, the lucifer cannon, in general, *does not* kill aliens instantly, except dretches. There are two main factors that contribute to this, the lucifer cannon charge time, and the lucifer cannon's shot speed. The shot speed of the lucifer cannon is huge here. Firstly, it limits the effective range of the lucifer cannon, given an opponent who will dodge. Secondly, it means that an "instakill" will take some time to complete, up to a second, given a resonable range. The charge time is also very important. The human has to know that the alien is coming, and when. To ambush an alien, the human has to know a lot more about the surrounding situation than an alien, who has a radar that updates constantly, and enough mobility, to make the human radar of limited use, given the degree of awareness required (although definitely not useless). Furthermore, the lucifer cannon makes a beeping sound when it is ready to kill a dragoon. If an alien is ambushed, it is in most cases, the aliens own damn fault. If the alien is aware of the lucifer, and holds back, the alien now has a few seconds of relative safety to approach the human. If at this point the alien is killed, it is far from instant. If the human is unaware of the alien, the human will have to spend the first few seconds charging as shot, also eliminating any advantage of killing speed.

So if you don't like dretches I understand (although I personally really enjoy dretching against stage 1 humans), but your claim that 1 hit kills are a problem because it allows the humans can kill the aliens so much faster, and the aliens have to spend a lot to prevent this, I do not understand your reasoning. Aliens have to spend exactly 1 evo to prevent themselves from being instakilled. And I think you are crazy if you are going basilisk because of its awesome HP reserves.

So tell me, specifically, why the mass driver, shotgun, (ie. the favorite anti-dretch weaponry) and/or (especially) the lucifer cannon is unbalanced. I'd love to do a few 1vs1 rounds of mara vs luci to "prove" my point.